I thought it might be helpful to share my story of POCD, and how there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I began this obsession in the middle of high school, due to a variety of stressors and past experiences. The thought of being aroused by children was so revolving that it took over my life, silently. I thought it would go away on its own, but it never left. At the worst point, I spent probably 8-9 hours a day obsessing. This went on for years, untreated, and, I became very depressed and felt so lonely. I started seeing a therapist, but they only saw the depression and not what caused it. I eventually was hospitalized for a while for the depression. I had considered that I might have OCD before, but since my rituals were mostly genital checking and avoidance, not something like hand-washing, I didn’t think it was OCD. But finally, my therapist suggested that we use an OCD framework. I saw an OCD specialist, and although I still thought I was a pedophile, I tried ERP and Lexapro. Now, I spend very little time daily, or even weekly, on my POCD, and I usually only do checking if reminded. It took nearly a year and a half from my diagnosis to get to this point, but I have slowly turned my life around and have reclaimed my life from that specific obsession. The biggest thing for me was learned to overcoming the stigma of my thoughts. The first step is being able to say your obsession, as terrible as it may be. Even writing down ”the P word” over and over is a huge step. You’re not evil, you’re not a bad person, and with hard work, you’ll get your life back.

Mine did!

Yes, it definitely took away from my ability to understand my true feelings

@chadster I am right in the middle of it not feeling any sexual attraction and it’s been this way for months.

@Hmac Hang in there. It’s difficult, probably the most difficult part. However, after a while it’ll become a lot easier to tell what OCD is telling you and what is natural and true for you.

How long have you been dealing with it

?

Sure

@Hmac Actually it’s okay, thank you though. I calmed myself down :)

Mine started when I was working at a summer camp and on my first day this 14 year old boy came up and I suddenly became fearful that I was sexually attracted to him. Which is crazy too because I had never even entertain the thought like that and I’m 21 and I have had OCD for a long time with all sorts of subtypes.

@Hmac Mine started at a summer camp too! Not the exact same story but pretty similar. How crazy

I used to take care of kids at the beginning of high school. Sometimes when they grabbed me a certain way, I would get slightly aroused. I didn’t think much of it until later in high school, when I was discovering thatI was gay. With what I was told growing up about gay people being pedos, my OCD latched onto that old memory, and it started, literally overnight.

@chadster Omg, that is EXACTLY what happened to me!!! And I am also gay. I can’t believe this.

@figuringitallout Wowww!! Glad you’re able to relate, and I am too!

@chadster I am! I’m so glad I saw your post. What really causes my POCD to occur is that I remembered that the few times when it happened, it was a male child and I’m convinced that means something bad, especially cause Im gay. It’s brutal

@chadster Only like 3 times it happened, and I was in high school, but still.

@chadster May I ask how old you are now?

@figuringitallout Sure! I’m 22 now. So it’s been about 5 years since I’ve had this obsession

@chadster That’s so weird — I’m also 22! I can’t get over how similar our stories are. Sorry again, you don’t have to answer, but when it happened to you, was it kids of the same gender or no? I’m only asking cause that’s what happened to me/what I’m stuck on.

@figuringitallout It’s great to know someone’s on a similar page! It was kids of both the same and opposite gender, which definitely affected how I experienced my POCD. I think my fears swayed from boys to girls to both, so I would say neither gender in particular. I do admit that my personal struggles with accepting my sexuality were very much complicated by my POCD, and that my POCD was affected by how I viewed my sexuality.

@chadster For sure — I always felt my sexuality was tainted, or I was like a “fucked up gay guy” cause this happened. For me it happened with boys, which was super scary. If it’s worth anything, my two therapists I’ve had both said this isn’t anything to be concerned over, and that it can happen for a variety of reasons.

@figuringitallout Not necessarily that this would apply to you, but I didn’t have a great relationship with men growing up and experienced no real bonding or male companionship, so when I told my therapist this happened she said that this happened because I was experiencing being in a fatherly position/bonding with a male child which I didn’t get, which could easily have triggered some hormones/blood to flow, but not in a sexual way.

@figuringitallout I know y’all didn’t ask me but I kinda saw parallels from the start of my ocd. Like my ocd well for this specific topic cane on overnight I’m not sure about the other thing :D but anyway I was talking to some friends when I had just turned nineteen and we were talking about braces or smth and I said braces can be cute in reference to the crush I had on a guy in my school year a year b4 then one of my friends said what are you a nonce, I googled the term and then my ocd pounced on me has been going for over a year, varying in severity

@owophoenix Don’t worry, I’m glad you shared! I’m sorry that that happened to you (I never heard of that term either.) how are you doing now??

@figuringitallout Mostly okay some days are better than others